New Delhi, Dec 28: A day after the National Investigation Agency arrested 10 persons after claiming to have busted a an Islamic State-inspired terror module, a Patiala House court here on Thursday allowed the family members and relatives of six of the accused to meet them inside the courtroom on Thursday.
However, the father of one was denied permission later as he did not possess the original identity proof.
The accused were arrested by the NIA in a joint operation with the Delhi police’s Special Cell from various locations in Delhi and western Uttar Pradesh. Parents of Anas Younus, Saqib Iftekar, Mohammad Azam, Zaid Malik and Zubair Malik met their children, while Rashid Zafar’s father could not meet him.
“The NIA took away all the documents from our house, including our identity proofs during the raid. I am just left with a photocopy of the ID proof and the court refused to accept it. I pray that my child gets back home at the earliest,” said Rashid’s father Iqbal Ahmad.
Mohammad Younus, father of Anas, said he was allowed to meet his son for just five minutes inside the court in the presence of policemen. “I asked him if he had any problem, but he refused to interact and just gestured to me that he was fine. I never imagined that one day I will see my son stand inside the court as a terror suspect with a masked face,” he said, adding that he believed his son was innocent and would be out soon.
Arguments in court
Counsel for the accused, M.S. Khan, said the NIA, during arguments in court, was unable to explain the “foreign-based handler” who masterminded the module as also the “instruments” recovered from the house that were intended to carry out “fidayeen attacks”.
“They are students. What the NIA has recovered includes a tractor’s power nozzle, which they planted and called a rocket launcher. What they [NIA] are calling explosives are actually ‘sutli bombs’ that are used during Diwali. There is a lot of fabrication,” Mr. Khan argued in court.
The court remanded the accused in 12-day police custody.
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